Flesh of the Servant
by Lady Stella Black
Summary: What if Peter Pettigrew was arrested at the end of Prisoner of Azkaban and the task of returning the Dark Lord to power fell to a different servant entirely? After escaping from Azkaban, it falls on Bellatrix Lestrange to successfully brew the Rudimentary Body Potion and care for her master until the time comes to restore him completely. Novel-length Bellamort; Goblet of Fire AU
1. Chapter 1: Her Highest Honor

**Chapter 1: Her Highest Honor**

Summer, 1994

Azkaban Prison

High Security Isolation Ward

" _Bellatrix. Bellatrix Lestrange…."_

Bellatrix shifted uncomfortably on her cot. 12 years in Azkaban and she was losing her damn mind.

" _Bellatrix...it's time for you to reunite with your master…"_

She reached a hand up to straighten out an uncomfortable crook in her neck, continuing to ignore the voices she was hearing. She'd always refused to be that prisoner to let herself go batshit crazy even though she knew there'd be a certain freedom in doing so...she always wanted to be able to maintain that she was stronger than that.

" _Bellatrix! Look at me this instant!"_ The voice grew suddenly more insistent, so Bellatrix squeezed her eyes shut, hoping to block it out. And then something happened...a senesation she hadn't felt in thirteen years.

Her Dark Mark was burning.

"My Lord," she whispered to herself, savoring the way the mark felt against her skin at that moment-like standing too close to a fire.

" _Yes,"_ rasped the voice inside her head. She'd never realized going crazy could happen like this, in a single anti-climactic instance. It always seemed (with other prisoners anyway) that it happened more gradually over time, like a slow decaying of the mind followed by a rejection of reason.

" _You aren't going crazy...at least, not in the way you think."_

"What is this?" she whispered into the open air even though she knew no one was listening.

" _What you've always wanted, isn't it? To be closer to me than any other servant?"_

No. It was too tempting. Some sort of trick. The dementors forcing her to relive her own deepest desires only to snatch them away...or just a fantasy in her mind. When other prisoners went crazy, did the voices in their heads talk back to them? Answer their questions?

" _Wasn't it you who always said there was no limit to my power?"_

Not being able to squeeze her eyes shut any tighter and getting a headache from the flashes of light she saw as a result of her efforts, Bellatrix snapped her eyes open and shot straight up on her cot. It wasn't that she expected to see him there...but even after years of dreaming of him, she'd never been able to replicate his voice in her mind so accurately.

And of course, once her eyes adjusted to the different kind of darkness, all she saw before her was her empty cell.

" _Trust me, Bellatrix. It is imperative that you do so or the plan for my return may continue to be delayed or even halted."_ He-it-sounded so insistent then, that she couldn't help but believe for even a second. Even if it was all a delusion, it was the happiest she'd been in years. Perhaps this was why so many of the others succumbed to going insane in here sooner-to experience the happy delusions.

"My Lord...it can't be...after all this time?"

" _But it is."_ His voice, though clearly coming from inside her own head, was intoxicating and warm all the same.

"Where are you?" she asked out loud. If she could only keep the delusion going, keep it feeling real, maybe she'd be able to endure the rest of her life sentence here after all.

" _You keep thinking this is all in your head. You're not wrong."_

"But..."

" _Here, let me give you a hint,"_ said the voice. And then Bellatrix's arm moved. It was a bit like an involuntary jerk, but more than that. Her left arm picked itself up and wrung itself out in the air.

But she didn't do that...had no reason to move her arm like that.

And then her legs moved. Bellatrix stood up, walked the perimeter of her tiny cell...all without consciously making herself move.

"My Lord...are you...possessing me?"

" _In a manner of speaking. I exist temporarily only as an incorporeal form, requiring a host to move about the physical world. So for the time, you can think of it as...I'm sharing you."_

A sudden rush of adrenaline coursed through her at the mere idea of what the voice was suggesting. Her master, the Dark Lord, not only returning from his long absence, but choosing _her_ as his vessel. The Dark Lord...inside of her...in such a way that no one else had never been, would never be allowed to be. Yet it was still so outlandish that she couldn't quite comprehend the incredible possibility.

"I don't doubt your power, master," she whispered. "But I doubt my strength. How am I to know it's really you with me and not some sort of delusion or trick brought on by my being isolated here for so long?"

The voice she wanted so desperately to believe was the Dark Lord went silent and for a few minutes, Bellatrix was alone with only her mixed-up thoughts. Had her doubt and attempt to return to reason chased away the temporary insanity that had overtaken her? Or...what if it really was the Dark Lord after all this time and she'd driven him away with her attitude? What if he chose another servant to help him return, taking her questioning as some form of rejection or weakness in her character? The second that horrific thought entered her mind she immediately decided she'd rather be crazy.

" _It would be my highest honor,"_ said the voice in a wandering sort of way, as if it was returning with less conviction than before.

"What?"

" _That's your answer to the question I posed to you the night we met at the recruitment event when you were fifteen years old. You were so young. I asked you why you wanted to serve me and you responded-"_

"...it would be my highest honor," she finished. Her eyes had begun to well up at their corners, but she still was not convinced. The voice had yet to say anything to her that she didn't already know.

" _Exitus Acta Probat, the tattoo script on my right shoulder,"_ the voice continued. _Meaning…"_

"The result validates the deed," said Bellatrix. But she knew that, too. How often she'd stared up at him, studied his body, tried to memorize every detail.

" _And I received it at the Torch Quill, in Knockturn Alley the summer after my fifth year at Hogwarts, after I killed my filthy muggle father. While receiving the tattoo, I thought of the idea for…?"_

"...The Dark Marks. It is you." An indescribable feeling of warmth flooded through Bellatrix's body at that moment, such that she thought she could withstand a hundred more dementors. Though it also came with something like shock. After all this time, nothing happening, waiting for a sign...coming so close to giving up completely, afraid to think maybe he really was...dare she even think it...dead? And now...

"But master, I have so many questions," she said quickly. "What happened that night? Where did you go? And how are you here now?"

" _We will have time for all of that later, when I can exist properly in my own body and we can discuss everything freely. For now, though, it is absolutely essential that we stick to the plan."_

"And what is the first step in your plan, my Lord?"

" _Getting you out of here."_


	2. Chapter 2: Fingers in Her Hair

**Chapter 2: Fingers in Her Hair**

Summer, 1994

Azkaban Prison

High Security Isolation Ward

" _Bellatrix. Are you...quite alright?"_ The low, rasping voice shook her out of her sleeping.

"My Lord," she whispered.

" _There is no need to speak aloud to me, remember. We share one shell. I can hear your thoughts."_

"So...all I have to do is think and you can hear me?"

" _Yes. It will save us the trouble of arousing anyone's suspicion."_

 _Can you hear me like this?_ she said in her mind as forcefully as she could. _I've been so lonely without you_ , she couldn't help but think as well and just as she struggled to cover it up, he responded:

" _Yes. I can hear you. And yes, I will admit I am most displeased to not have found you sooner."_

Bellatrix forced her eyes open and blinked up at her cell. It was a disgusting place. If she could have had her say, she would have wanted the Dark Lord to find her looking beautiful and in much more becoming conditions. Instead, she was shivering under a threadbare blanket in a tiny concrete cell with dirt flooring and mold growing on its walls.

" _Your train of thought amuses me greatly…"_ his voice cut into her mental diatribe and Bellatrix's cheeks flushed. " _But are you well?"_ he continued. " _You've slept quite a long time…"_

Bellatrix shivered again and struggled to pull the corners of the blanket up around her shoulders. _I sleep a lot here_ , she thought. _It's not like there's much else to do. I'm in isolation so I never get to leave. The dementors feed me twice a day to get my strength up and then they feed -on- me about an hour after each meal and sometimes more frequently._

" _They feed...on you?"_ he asked.

 _You know how dementors are. They can't suck out all our souls at once or they'd have nothing left to eat. Souls aren't renewable, after all. Instead they drain us a little every day, trying to leave us with nothing left but our worst feelings and memories. I think isolation prisoners get fed on more because we're thought to be more despairing and that's why so many go mad or kill themselves,_ she thought bitterly.

" _Not having emotional capability myself, I never quite understood the experience. The few times I have been in their presence, I have felt very...physically cold...but nothing more than that. Bellatrix, what do experience when in the presence of the dementors-or when they feed on you as you say?"_

She bit down hard on her lip. _I relive losing you every time. I'm made to feel like I could have done something different, gone with you that night...all sorts of guilt-drowning things like that._ She toyed anxiously with a hole in one of the sleeves of her prison robes.

" _And is it just the dementors here on guard all the time? Is there ever anyone else?"_

Eager for the change of subject, Bellatrix responded immediately in her mind. _The Ministry of Magic sends someone out about once a month to bring supplies for the island and check up on things...I've actually been in interrogation with Ministry wizards a few times, but that was in the early years and then I think they finally gave up when they realized they weren't going to get anything out of me._

"Or they gave up on any possibility of my return," the Dark Lord replied so smugly that Bellatrix had to laugh a little, but then she stopped just as quickly. The heavy iron door of her cell creaked open slightly and then she felt even colder than she had before. The ends of her hair glazed over crisply with frost as a dementor strode through bearing one of her daily meals. Hardened, stale biscuits and water in a dirty cup with a dead spider floating in it. _Breakfast of Quidditch Champions...damn I'd love to eat something again that isn't fucking disgusting,_ she thought before she could stop herself and flicked a piece of mold or dirt off of one of the biscuits.

" _What an unfortunate place to be,"_ said the Dark Lord, as soon as the dementors left.

 _You're telling me,_ she thought back to him and then immediately felt guilty. He had _died_ and come back to life and here she was complaining about cold biscuits.

" _I am not displeased, Bella. On the contrary, you have sacrificed much for me and never renounced the old ways. I am...pleased with you. And I intend to reward you beyond the others if our plan succeeds...so tell me, what are you most looking forward to when you are to finally leave this place?"_

 _A….a long, hot shower._ She was almost embarrassed to even admit it. She hadn't been able to wash her hair properly in...well, she didn't like to think about it too much. She tried to come it through with her fingers whenever she got to thinking about it, but after awhile it just matted over and over itself anyway.

" _Let me,"_ he said simply and before she could reason out what he meant, her arm was acting of its own accord again. It was her own fingers running through her hair, undoing knots where they could...but at the same time, if she closed her eyes... _he_ was doing it. He was there with her.

"Mmmhhmmm," she breathed out loud into the touch. It was so innocent, but in a way, it was the first touch she'd felt from another person in over a decade and it made her want...so much more. But she couldn't think about that. Not until her thoughts were her own again.

" _Bella, what-"_ the Dark Lord began to say, but then he stopped abruptly-even letting Bellatrix's arm fall back awkwardly at her side. The door was creaking open again, but this time, the dementors weren't there to bring food. She was the food.

.

 _~"Will you be attending Roddy's and my Halloween party, my Lord?"_ This time she heard both their voices in her head as clearly as if she were listening to a radio.

 _~"And why would I bother myself with such utter foolishness?"_

 _~"I just thought…"_

 _~"You never think, Bella."_

 _~But my Lord, if I could go with you...maybe…" she trailed off as he stared imperiously at her to let her know the matter was finished. And she did not try to fight it._ All she had to do was think of something happy. He wasn't gone. He was here. And everything was going to be alright, she was going to help restore him, she-

"Mnghhh," she choked out. She struggled to breathe as two dementors loomed over her-what if they took too much? What if she couldn't help him?

Different memory, same theme.

 _~My Lord, what did I do wrong? I live only to serve you…_

 _~You...touched me._

 _~It was a simple hand on your arm-I was trying to congratulate you for-_

 _~You. Touched. Me._

And then they left her, gasping for breath on the floor of her cell. And everything was silent. Somewhere else in the fortress, another prisoner screamed.

" _Bella_ ," she heard him rasp finally in her head.

 _My Lord...pardon my sharpness, but, how exactly are we going to get me out of this hell hole?_ He didn't answer right away and she wondered if perhaps she'd turned him away with her questioning (or the memories the dementors surfaced).

" _Again, I am not cross with you, Bella, I was thinking. But if I have to continue to remind you of this I may become...frustrated."_

 _You can hear my thoughts but I can't hear yours? My Lord?_ She hurriedly added the title onto her thought so that she wouldn't sound so rude.

" _I am the form possessing your mind and body, Bellatrix. Not the other way around."_ Yes, that had to be it, but still...it was all so confusing.

" _At any rate, I was curious as to whether or not you'd heard of the fate that befell our old associate, Crouch jr."_ Bellatrix did not know how Barty Crouch figured into any plan to break her out of Azkaban prison, but as she did not have any reason nor desire to question the Dark Lord, she went with it.

 _That pathetic bastard who was arrested with me? So young he still had baby cheeks. His Daddy worked for the Ministry and his Mummy was some high society-he wanted to get his revenge on them in the best way he could think, couldn't even raise a wand to those fat Aurors though could he? Didn't last a week in here before the dementors were burying his ass out on the island. Shame,_ she added, though she didn't entirely mean it. She'd joined the Dark Lord as a teenager, too, but had always thought herself at least more useful than that cowardly rich boy.

" _And did you know that dementors, being blind, can't tell the difference between individual prisoners-only between those who are healthy and those who are weak and dying?"_ the Dark Lord went on as if she hadn't answered him.

 _My Lord, forgive my ignorance, but what are you getting at?_

" _Furthermore,"_ he continued, ignoring her again. " _Were you aware that at the time of your arrest, Crouch's mother was ill and dying?"_

"I...what does that...no. No, it can't be-he was beside me at the trial, he-" If what he was implying was true...it tore at her so strongly she forgot to keep her words in her head.

" _He was. Now, do you remember what I resent in a person more than cowardice, more than almost any other human weakness?"_

 _Of course. Empathy, my Lord._

" _I learned recently that Crouch's parents used their ministry connections to gain one final visit with their son in the prison, after a ministry offiicial on a visit told them he wasn't doing well. The mother took Polyjuice potion and switched places with her son. The dementors only recognized one healthy and one dying person entering Azkaban and one healthy and one dying person leaving…."_

 _So the Crouch they buried was actually-_

" _The mother. Well done, Bellatrix, it seems you've caught on."_

 _That stupid cowardly fuck-_

" _Later, Bellatrix. It is not the prisoner who escaped that is my concern at present. It is the method. You told me that a ministry official visits the prison about once a month for inspections and to drop off supplies, is that correct?"_

 _Yes, my Lord,_ she replied back _. But they only ever peek in to the cells. They don't like to linger. I think being around the dementors is especially harmful to those who think they're somehow above the rest of us. Those are usually the weaker people anyway..._ She let her thoughts get away from her again. How were they going to get her out? It was all seeming too risky...she didn't care what happened to her at this point, hell, she'd even take death over living out the rest of her life sentence in Azkaban, but if she messed up the plan somehow and halted the Dark Lord's return...she didn't want to fathom it.

" _Relax, Bellatrix. When the Ministry witch or wizard comes to call on your cell, I will leave your body and possess theirs. At which point you will take that person's wand and identification. You will leave the prison posing as that person. The dementors will only recognize one healthy person entering Azkaban and one healthy person leaving-I will give you an address to which you will apparate off the island when you leave the prison and you will await further instruction from me there,"_ he explained. " _For this to work, we will need to get you as strong and healthy as we can in whatever time we have before the ministry official comes to call again. We will also need to prepare a small collection of memories you can use to conjure a patronus to escort you from the prison walls and past the dementors."_

It all sounded entirely reasonable when he said it, but hadn't he always said his Death Eaters had no need for Patronuses?

" _Do you trust your Master, Bellatrix?"_

"With my whole life," she whispered aloud.

" _Out of curiousity, have you ever conjured a Patronus?"_

 _Yes, my Lord. I had to learn when I was studying for my N.E.W.T.S._

" _And what is it?"_

 _An Ashwinder, my Lord._ She still remembered the first Patronus she ever conjured. Her entire seventh year defense against the dark arts class was practicing for the NEWTS in a secure area against a single dementor brought to Hogwarts by one of the examiners to give the students practice. When it was Bellatrix's turn, she thought of her happiest memory and was one of the only students to succeed in producing a Patronus on the first try.

She was surprised, in a way, when the silvery fire serpent came slithering from her wand tip. But then again, she'd always been fascinated by them. Born from unchecked fire, the ashwinder lived for only about an hour, but in that time could amass trails of destruction and lay the eggs that were used in love potion.

" _And what memory did you select?"_ said the Dark Lord interestedly.

 _The day I received the Dark Mark, my Lord._

She laid back on her cot for awhile, staring up at the ceiling of her cell and thinking about all sorts of things-mostly boring her master with facts about ashwinders to cover up the lingering, fantastical notion of their beautiful existence-snakes made from fire whose primary purpose was to fuel an obsessive love so strong they'd die for it-and they did die, every damn time.


End file.
